I Wonder What I Love Most About . . .

. . . Autumn.

Springtime is so lovely. This past spring was particularly fecund for me, as it was the season when I welcomed my first baby. The tulips were nodding, the azaleas in bloom, and the trees budding green when I carried my son up the front porch stairs for the first time.

Following spring is, of course, the summer, a season I embrace with more enthusiasm than ever now that I have a child to share it with. We bought a handful of pool passes, even though he was a mite young to enjoy the community pool. I took him hiking, the dog trotting purposefully beside us. We sat outside at the green plastic table and chairs that I bought for about $5 at Wal Mart, and I showed him green leaves, brown branches, blue sky. The husband, when he could come out with us (summer saw the close of the school year, but not nearly the end of schoolwork for him), always managed to wheedle me into stopping at the new ice cream shop.

The end of summer tends to be miserable here in the American South. Mosquitos whine and bite, the sun beats. Both conspired against me lazing in the hammock, and instead I sat inside watching too many Netflixed television shows. I began to feel loose-skinned, doughy, unwell. September, for various reasons, was not kind to me this year.

This year more than ever, then, I welcome it, my son's first autumn, enraptured as always with the frothy perfection of a Carolina October. Tank top days and sweaters for night time - a fire is called for of an evening, and I am once again delighted that I bought a chiminea three years ago, a present for my new homeowning self. I love a pot pie, heavy gravy, root vegetables, simmering in the Crock Pot. I love the smell of pumpkins.

Autumn is Halloween, and I am trying to think of a clever costume that I can make for my five month old. Trick or treat will be a different endeavor for these next many years, and though he has not enough teeth for candy and I don't need any myself, we will still take him.

Autumn is turning leaves, and I know that he will love to watch them fall. Will learn to walk through drifts of them, and love their crunch under his feet, between his gummy jaws (he will get a handful in his mouth, without doubt.) We will take him to a farm to pet animals, walk among hay bales, select a pumpkin. He's too young to remember, but there will be pictures.

Autumn is a chill in the air, when the hat and gloves come out, but not the heavy coats and scarves. Autumn is Thanksgiving, with my parents this year, which will probably mean dinner in our pajamas, cinnamon rolls for the morning. Autumn means we are on the cusp of Christmas, when two babies, four parents, two grandparents, and two great grandparents (along with an obscene amount of dogs) will gather for stockings by the hearth, though we have agreed for the sake of thrift to buy gifts this year only for the children.

Children. Yes. This year, autumn also brings me a much loved and looked for niece, a cousin for our son. Autumn, a bounteous harvest, one I cannot wait to share with my son for the first time.